The Internet - Research Article from St. James Encyclopedia of Popular Culture

The term didn't appear in a major American newspaper until 1988, but the Internet has become the most powerful individual electronic communications network in the world's history. From high-pressure advertising to a brief message from a political prisoner, Internet e-mail and World Wide Web sites make it possible for anyone with a computer, software, and an appropriate connection to speak to the world at the speed of light with the touch of a keypad. In the process, the Internet has added a host of new phrases and words, such as information superhighway, spam, hyperlink, chat rooms, flames, and dotcom, into the English language and revolutionized the culture. It has also led to serious concerns about the ready access it provides to pornography, violence, and hate literature, the loss of personal privacy it has occasioned, the spread of mis-and dis-information, and the future of books, newspapers, and magazines...